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Promising ways to encode and manipulate quantum information

Quantum computers require controlled encoding to protect computations from environmental noise. Two experiments have achieved such encoding using what are known as infinite-dimensional quantum systems.
  1. Alessandro Ferraro

    1. Alessandro Ferraro is at the School of Mathematics and Physics, Queen’s University Belfast, Belfast BT7 1NN, UK.

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Transmitting or manipulating information in a noisy environment typically requires some form of encoding and error correction. If these precautions are necessary when information is carried by classical physical systems, they are even more so when the carriers are fragile quantum systems. However, quantum encoding is notoriously difficult, because the laws of quantum mechanics impose severe constraints — for example, a single quantum object cannot be copied, which hinders simple encoding schemes. Consequently, the manipulation of encoded quantum systems, which is necessary for error correction, can be extremely involved. In two papers in Nature, Flühmann et al.1 and Gao et al.2 report promising methods for encoding and manipulating quantum information using, respectively, the state of motion of a trapped ion and the state of multiple photons in superconducting cavities.

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Nature 566, 460-462 (2019)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-00647-3

References

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